The push for "environmentally friendly" insect traps correlates with the public's increased awareness of the health and environmental effects of insecticide use. The basic principle is to attract an insect to the trap where the insect is subsequently contained or destroyed. Such traps include the electrified UV lamp (where an insect is drawn toward the lamp where it is electrified) and the "lobster pot" trap (where an insect is drawn into a container which is difficult, by design, for the insect to escape). Most variances in these "environmentally friendly" insect traps regard a modification in either the attractant or the trapping mechanism used.
Attractants vary in effectiveness and in their specificity to certain insects. The attractant most used is color. Different insects are attracted to different colors. Flies have been found to be attracted to a yellow to yellow-green hue, while mosquitoes have an affinity to a white hue. By modifying the color of the container used for the trapping mechanism, a specificity may be obtained for a certain insect.
Another productive attractant is the use of odor. Odiferous attractants usually mimic those smells associated with an insect's feeding or reproductive cycle. Therefore, such stimuli prove to be highly effective. One such odor-emitting trap exhausts an odiferous mixture resembling the decomposition of matter from within its container. Although effective, the odor emitted from such traps is often repugnant to humans making them ill suited for certain applications.
Other insects are naturally attracted to odors which are non-offensive to humans. Mosquitoes, for instance, are attracted to carbon dioxide. This non-offensive gas is emitted from the human body, as well as other natural sources. Some prior art traps are designed utilizing this attractant. One trap utilizes a separate carbon dioxide source to naturally lure insects into the container of the trap. Once inside the container, the insect is trapped by the container's design. Subsequently, the insect flies until exhausted from trying to escape the confines of the container, whereby the insect finally succumbs falling into the entrapping liquid.